In this paper, we discuss whether the ability of individuals to convert commercial bank money (i.e., bank deposits) into central bank money is fundamentally important for the monetary system. This is a significant question since the use of cash - the only form of central bank money that the...

The emergence of digital currencies such as Bitcoin and the underlying blockchain and distribution ledger technology have attracted significant attention. These developments have raised the possibility of considerable impacts on the financial system and perhaps the wider economy. This paper...

A key issue in the renewal of the inflation-control agreement is the question of the appropriate level of the inflation target. Many observers have raised concerns that with the reduction in the neutral rate, and the experience of the recent financial crisis, the effective lower bound (ELB) is...

This paper evaluates the effects of forward guidance and large-scale asset purchases (LSAP) when the nominal interest rate reaches the zero lower bound. I investigate the effects of the two policies in a dynamic new Keynesian model with financial frictions adapted from Gertler and Karadi (2011,...

Digital currencies store balances in anonymous electronic addresses. We analyze the tradeoffs between the safety and convenience of aggregating balances in addresses, electronic wallets and banks. In our model, agents balance the risk of theft of a large account with the cost to safeguarding a...

Combining the high-frequency multidimensional approach of Gürkaynak et al. (2005) with Greenbook measures of the Federal Reserve's information set as in Romer and Romer (2004), I propose a new method of constructing a monetary policy shock that occurs on Federal Reserve announcement days. I...

We conduct a follow-up to Chen et al. (2020) and study demand for and use of cash after the containment measures imposed at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic were relaxed during the summer of 2020. We find that bank notes in circulation continued to rise in July due to ongoing cash...

Since 1991, the Bank of Canada has had an inflation‐targeting (IT) framework established by a joint agreement between the Bank and the Government of Canada. The framework is reviewed every five years as part of the process for renewing the inflation‐control agreement. This discussion paper...

24/7 payment settlement may impact the demand for central bank reserves and thus could have an effect on monetary policy implementation. Using the standard workhorse model of monetary policy implementation (Poole, 1968), we show that 24/7 payment settlement induces a precautionary demand for...

The characteristics that distinguish most developing countries, compared to large industrialized countries, include: greater exposure to supply shocks in general and trade volatility in particular, procyclicality of both domestic fiscal policy and international finance, lower credibility with...